Most parents still do not know about these exams, but those who do are fighting back and some are planning to have their children boycott them. See the resolution in support of a boycott, passed by CEC 20, and articles in GothamSchools, WSJ, NYT SchoolBook.

To the right is a copy of a memo (click to enlarge) recently sent to high schools by Candace Shyer, head of the NY State Education's Office of State
Assessment, which says:

“Students should not be informed of the connection
between these fields tests and State assessments. The field tests should
be described as brief test of achievement in the subject.”

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Speaker Quinn’s push for mandatory Kindergarten in NYC, now being considered in the NY State Legislature, is likely to send thousands of new children into a schools system that is already struggling with Kindergarten waiting lists, overcrowding, and increased class sizes.

Our analysis here and below suggests what the impact may be, and proposes that the city speed up the capital plan to ensure that there is space added in our elementary schools at the same time.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

The Community Education Council in District 20 in Brooklyn called a special meeting and unanimously passed a resolution in
support of the boycott of the field tests.
Here are articles about this growing movement: GothamSchools, WSJ, SchoolBook. Bravo!

Resolution: In Support of Parents Boycott
of Stand-Alone Field Tests

WHEREAS, our children have just spent six days in April taking New York State
standardized tests in English and Math, which was nearly double the time
compared to last year, and

Whereas, this April's exams included up to 30% field test questions, which were
embedded to try out for future tests and do not count in children's scores;
however, they make the tests substantially longer, so that most children spent
up to nine hours testing and children with IEPs up to eighteen hours testing
over the six day period, and

Whereas, Pearson Publishing and NYSED [NY State Education Department] have not asked parents' permission to
utilize our children as research subjects for Pearson's financial benefit as a
for-profit company, and

Whereas, eighth grade students will be preparing for Regents exams in June and
will be losing valuable instructional time to stand-alone field tests.

Therefore, be it resolved, that Community Education Council District 20 finds
it unacceptable that even more valuable classroom time be allocated to the
administering of test questions and

Further resolved, that Community Education Council District 20 supports the
parents' boycott of the field tests, as there are no negative consequences for
our schools or our children if they do not take these stand-alone tests.

Monday, May 21, 2012

Unbeknownst to most parents, the state is imposing yet
another round of standardized testing in June. You can check to see what grade
your child's elementary or middle school is field testing here. High schools are also field
testing the Regents; more more information here and here.

New York City – Change the Stakes, a coalition of parents and educators in
New York City, announces its opposition to the latest round of standardized testing,
the stand-alone field tests that are scheduled to be given in June. Over a thousand (1,029) public
elementary and middle schools in the city are scheduled to participate in this
additional statewide testing. Last week, science field testing took place
in 116 other New York City schools.

The price tag for this
extra developmental testing is conservatively estimated to be $3 million. It
comes on top of the six days (540 minutes) of regularly scheduled English
Language Arts (ELA) and math exams administered just last month, when the items
being field tested were embedded within the state-mandated tests. This
doubled the amount of time needed to complete the exams.

The New York State
Education Department (SED) and test publisher, NCS Pearson, Inc., have not
provided advance notice to the public about the June field tests nor
sufficiently explained why they are necessary. Moreover, testing experts regard
stand-alone testing as a dubious practice at best, and virtually useless when
conducted so very late in the school year.

“June is a terrible time
of year to test children—be it operational or field testing,” asserts Fred
Smith, a test specialist formerly with the city Department of Education (DOE).
“The expectation that children will be motivated to perform at their best near
the end of the year doesn’t even rise to the level of wishful thinking,” stated
Mr. Smith. He also points out that stand-alone field testing by SED was
discredited for yielding misleading data on which to develop new tests. “In
2009, SED’s test advisers acknowledged this approach was problematic because
students who took the exams knew they were experimental.”

SED’s elementary and
intermediate school field tests will be administered between June 5th and 15th.
Most schools will test only one grade between 3rd through 8th;however,
259 (23%) of the schools are being asked to give the experimental
exams on two grade levels.(Change the Stakes is providing
user-friendly information about all field test school and grade assignments
broken down by borough at changethestakes.org.
Parents can visit the website to find out what tests are due to be given this
June in their children’s schools.)

The primary purpose of
the June stand-alone testing period is to allow Pearson, the State’s education
testing contractor, to perform research for operational exams it will then sell
to the SED. The State is on record as stating participation in field
testing is “not mandatory,” yet schools and parents in New York City have been
kept in the dark and not advised that they have a choice about whether or not
their children should participate.

“Our kids are being used
as guinea pigs for the financial benefit of Pearson, to the detriment of their
own educational experience,” said Deyanira Ruiz, who has a daughter in a grade
that has been selected for field testing.“They’ve already lost untold hours to test prep and the April math and
literacy exams, reducing the amount of time devoted to art, physical education,
social studies, and languages,” she added.

Some teachers are
questioning the use of valuable class time for field testing. Lauren Cohen, a
teacher in Manhattan, is fed up. “Far too many of us teach in schools that
already face enormous pressure to dedicate an excessive amount of classroom time
to test preparation between September and April. My school received a
notice, on Pearson letterhead, informing us that we must also give an ELA field
test to 3rd graders in June,” she said. “Field tests supply no useful
information to teachers or educational benefits to children. My students are
burnt out on testing, and this meaningless drudgery will take away valuable
learning time,” stated Ms. Cohen.

Fueling a rebellion
among parents against the upcoming field tests is the disclosure to date of roughly
30 errors, along with some questionable content, on the tests administered
in April. The state forbids the disclosure of test items, further undermining
parent confidence in the exams themselves. Diana Zavala, parent of a 3rd grader
in Manhattan, contends, “Transparency and accountability should also apply to
the corporations making the tests. If we are to believe these tests are
worthwhile and that the company is making ‘better tests,’ we should be able to
examine them.” She added, “but what we really want is more teaching, less
testing, and assessment that is more connected to the actual learning that
takes place in the classroom.”

Change the Stakes is Calling
for the Following Regarding June Field Testing:

The
DOE should immediately disclose specific information about the stand-alone
field tests, explaining their nature and purpose and notifying parents of
children in the 1,029 field test schools about the dates the tests are
scheduled to be given.

Pearson
and the SED should address the claim by independent testing experts that
the timing and format of these tests make it unlikely they will generate
reliable data needed to develop valid operational exams.

SED
and DOE should allow parents and entire schools to opt out of
participating and only administer field tests to students in
schools/grades for whom explicit parental consent has been granted.
The need to obtain authorization to test their children from parents
or guardians should extend to all testing when the main objective is to
support research and development for commercial testing products.

Non-participating students in schools and grades
undergoing testing should have a meaningful educational alternative
activity during the testing period.

Change the Stakes, a committee
of the Grassroots Education Movement, was formed to expose the damaging effects
of high-stakes standardized tests. We are a group of parents and teachers
working to build and unite opposition to high stakes testing in New York City.
Our membership includes a group of parents who refused to have their children
tested during the regular State exam period in April 2012. We believe
high-stakes testing must be replaced by more educationally-sound and balanced
forms of student, teacher, and school assessment.

See our online
petition demanding that New York State develop a non-punitive process by
which parents concerned about the impacts of high-stakes testing on student
learning can opt their children out of standardized tests.

I urge you to reject the application of Success Academy to
open two charter schools in District 2 on the following grounds:

1.Attrition and push-out rates: This charter chain has a
very high student and teacher attrition rate, as referenced in news articles
and its NYS report cards [annual teacher attrition rates of 38%, 56%,
19%, 50% and 26%.] It also has a documented
history of pushing out high-needs students.
And yet the new charter law explicitly says that charter schools should
demonstrate an effort to recruit and retain at –risk children. This is
not a model which deserves replication elsewhere in the city.

2. Evidence of excessive compensation and proposed
charter management fees: Ms. Moskowitz receives an annual salary in excess of
$379,478, in addition to benefits worth more than $24,000, amounting to a total
compensation package of $403,660, according to the latest available (2009)
submission to the IRS by the Success Charter Network.

Governor Cuomo has inveighed against excessive salaries
for district superintendents who receive far lower salaries, and has proposed
capping superintendents’ salaries at $175,000 a year in districts with fewer
than 10,000 students. According to the SUNY charter website, the Success chain
of charters has fewer than 3,000 students.

The Governor has also created a task force to investigate
excessive compensation levels at not-for-profits that receive taxpayer support
from the state, and in January, signed an executive order to limit spending
for executive pay at state-funded service providers, including a $199,000
salary cap.

In addition, Ms. Moskowitz has applied for an increase in her management fees to 15%. These fees are twice the average for a NYC CMO (7%) and close to the average of
for-profit NYC EMOs (17%). New charters run by EMOS are now banned by law, as I’m sure you are aware.
Her excessive compensation and proposed hike in fees reveals a lack of fiscal
prudence with taxpayer funds, and she should not be rewarded with permission to
expand her network until these other matters are fully resolved.

3.Overwhelming parent and community opposition: At
District 2 hearings about this application, scores of local parents and
community members spoke out and have signed petitions opposing these
applications. To my knowledge, not a single elected official representing
the district supports these proposals and many have submitted comments against
them. The Community Education Council in District 2 passed a resolution
in opposition to these applications, as well as Manhattan Community Boards 5,6,
and 8.

“SUNY’s proposal review
process must generally ‘consider the demand for charter schools by the
community,’ per Education Law § 2852(9-a)(b)…applicants
will also be required to show evidence of community interest in and support for
the school.”

Approving this charter would appear to violate the intent of the law.

4.Likely
impact on overcrowding, class size and the city’s C4E commitments: The
co-location of two more charter schools in D 2 would likely lead to more
overcrowding in a district that is already extremely overcrowded, and would
prevent the district’s schools from reducing class sizes to optimal levels as
set out in the city’s legally-mandated Contracts for Excellence plan. The
DOE’s utilization rates assumes class sizes of 28 in grades 4-8, rather than
its C4E goal of 23 students per class in these grades, in the plan that was
submitted by the city and approved by the State Education Department in
2007.

Already,
average class sizes in the district have risen above the goals in the plan, and
are likely to increase even more if additional co-locations are approved in the
district. See the charts below:

And
yet class size reduction is one of very few reforms that have been shown to
narrow the achievement gap, and one of only four cited by the Institute ofEducation Sciences that have been proven to work through rigorous evidence to
improve learning for all students, no matter their background.

4.Potential impact on disabled students: As NY State Senator Liz Krueger points out, two of the schools that are officially “underutilized” on the DOE’s
list of possible co-locations for Success Academy house disabled students:
the School for the Deaf on E. 23 St, and the middle school for
students with autism wthin the Julia Richman complex. And yet the DOE’s
utilization formula does not take into account the special needs of this
populations, widely recognized by state and city regulations and
guidelines pertaining to space.

5.Safety : I also want to echo the concerns of Sen.
Krueger about the inability of SUNY to ensure proper safety without knowing in
advance where this school will likely be sited. As she writes:

New York State Education Law Section 2853(3) states that in New York City "all charters authorized...shall be obliged to comply with the department's health, safety and sanitary requirements applicable to facilities to the same extent as non-charter public schools in each such city school district." It is simply impossible to ensure that these requirements are met if siting information is not included in the charter application for authorization. Moreover, since there is no mechanism at the state level to address any negative impacts on children's safety, sanitation, or health after a charter has been approved, it is absolutely imperative that these issues be thoroughly examined and addressed during the authorization process.

Conclusion:In the interests
of good governance, fiscal prudence, educational equity, and safety, I urge you
to reject the applications of to establish two new Success Academy charter
schools in District 2.

See also the far more detailed comments of WAGPOPs [Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents: Our Public Schools] here.

Dear SUNY board and SUNY Charter Institute:

I urge you to reject the application of Citizens of the World to
open two charter schools in D14, on the following grounds:

1.Tangled
governance: Kristean Dragon is identified on Oct. 2011 as the Founding Board Chair of Citizens of the World in a formal
application to the state of California to open
two new charter schools,and is still listed as board chair on the website of the
chain’s charter schools. Yet on a different website of Citizens of the World, she is now
also identified as the Chief Executive Officer
of the charter chain.

2.Evidence
of possible corruption: Kristean Dragon was also, at least until
recently, also the Executive Director of The Wonder of Reading, an organization
which raises funds to equip Los Angeles public schools with libraries.
This organization still shares an address with the national network of Citizens
of the World. In 2011, the Los Angeles NBC affiliate ran an investigative
series, alleging that the Wonder of Reading program raised funds to pay companies
that engaged in kickbacks, leading to huge cost overruns. Unfortunately, the website of Wonder of Reading appears to be defunct and
seems to have lapsed sometime in 2010.

3.Self-dealing
and potential excessive compensation: Posted online on the Citizens of the
World website is a service contract between the charter school and Wonders of
Reading, for the latter organization to provide services to the charter school,
extending into the 2014-2015 school year. Even if never executed, this proposed contract is
evidence of self-dealing and questionable ethics on the part of Ms. Dragon and
the charter board that should disqualify her from running charter schools in
our state or any other. In addition, in 2010, Ms. Dragon, is listed as
working full time for Wonder of Reading in its 990 IRS
form, and receiving a salary of $197, 731 from the latter organization, plus
$14,493 in benefits. Because Citizens of the World has not submitted its
IRS 2010-2011 form to Guidestar, it is impossible to see what salary, if any,
she may have also been receiving from Citizens of the World.

4.Fiscal
instability: On March 23, 2012, Citizens of the World Hollywood,
the single existing CWCS charter school, took out a $250,000 loan from the
state of California. Their board minutes from February 16, 2012 point to the
need for this loan to cover their cash flow problems and state that they are
looking towards additional fundraising by parents to sustain themselves. In
board minutes dated January 19, 2012, Samira Estilai from ExED, provider
of business management services for the charter is quoted as follows:

”Additionally,
she noted that with the deferrals and if the revolving loan doesn’t come
through CWC would have a negative ending balance of approximately $15-20k.
Strategies to address this include working to move up the schedule of donations
from CWC Founder Mark Gordon to ensure a positive ending balance.”

This points to poor financial management of the
organization; and the potential risk that NY state taxpayer funds may be used to
cover the shortfall of the CMO’s operations in California.

5.Confusing
and ambiguous management structure: The applications posted on the
SUNY website for the two proposed Citizens of the
World Schools list no name for the CMO, and instead says: “Not applicable”, even as this is clearly supposed to be
part of a national chain of charters. This is pointed out in the same
minutes of their Hollywood charter school as cited above:

“Amy Held
updated the board that CWC Schools is working throughout the country in
similarly naturally diverse communities exploring the possibility of opening
charters that share the same mission and model as CWCH. These include NY,
Minnesota and the South.”

In the forms filled out by the proposed
board of trustees of these NY schools, the same answer is given when the
question is asked if the board member or his or her spouse know anyone
connected to the CMO: “not applicable because the school does not contact
[sic] with a management company or charter management organization.” And
yet the application also says that these NYC charters “will be part of the national network of Citizens of the
World Charter Schools.” What will
the legal and financial relationship between the charter schools in Southern
California and those in New York City, if there is no CMO? This is a
troubling question. The fact that the
applications of both charter schools also appear to list identical proposed
board members is yet another concern.

6.Overwhelming
community opposition: At District 14 hearings about this
application, hundreds of local parents and community members spoke in
opposition to the granting of this charter. Not one member of the
community stood up in support. Every elected official speaking on the record
opposed the proposal, from the federal level (US Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez)
to the state (Assemblyman Joe Lentol) to the borough president (Brooklyn
Borough President Marty Markowitz) and City Council members (CM Diana Reyna and
Stephen Levin). The Community Education Council in D 14 also passed a
resolution in opposition to these charters. The new charter law was written
expressly so that authorizers would have to take community input into
consideration when making a decision. According to SUNY Charter
Institute’s own RFP Guidance Handbook:

“SUNY’s proposal review process must
generally ‘consider the demand for charter schools by the community,’ per
Education Law § 2852(9-a)(b).” And: “…applicants will also be
required to show evidence of community interest in and support for the school.”

Approving this charter would appear to
violate the intent of the law.

7.Segregating
effect: As pointed out by Brooke Parker on our NYC Parent blog, Citizens of the World charters imply in their applications that they are
seeking to be composed of students with a much different racial composition
than most of the other public schools in the district, with a far greater number
of white students and a smaller proportion of black and Hispanic students.
Nationally, charters have been shown to have a segregating effect,
and these charters would interfere with the gradual integration of neighborhood
schools that is occurring because of gentrification and as a result of federal
magnet grants. In addition, the new charter law says that charter schools
should show an intention to enroll and retain comparable numbers of high-needs
students as the communities in which they are located.

8.Likely
impact on equity, class size and the city’s C4E commitments: The
co-location of two more charter schools in D 14 would likely lead to more
overcrowding and prevent the district’s schools from reducing class sizes to
optimal levels and those set out in the city’s legally-mandated Contracts for
Excellence plan. The DOE’s utilization rates assumes class sizes of 28 in
grades 4-8, rather than its C4E goal of 23 for these grades, in the plan that
was adopted and approved by the state in 2007.

Already, average class sizes in the
district have risen above the goals in the plan, and are
likely to increase even higher if additional co-locations are approved in the
district. See the charts below:

.

And yet class size reduction is one of very few reforms that
have been shown to narrow the achievement gap, and one of only four cited by
the Institute of Education Sciences that have been proven to work through
rigorous evidence to improve learning for all students, no matter their
background.

Conclusion: In the interests of good
governance, fiscal prudence, racial integration, and educational equity, I urge
you to reject the applications of Citizens of the World charter schools in D14.

Friday, May 18, 2012

Have you ever wondered how what Joel Klein was busy writing on his Blackberry during meetings?

Or how closely he worked with
the charter lobby to get the charter cap lifted and on other issues?

Now’s your chance to find out. The UFT FOILed emails between DOE and the
charter lobbyists and got a large bunch of messages after long delay and obstructionism
from DOE. Apparently more emails are
coming.

The ones I’ve seen make it
appear that Klein, and others at Tweed, including the DOE lobbyist, Micah Lasher, were working for the privateers
and the hedge-funders more than they were working for our kids.

Here are all the emails released so far (in PDF form). Please take a look, and leave any
observations and/or especially revealing exchanges in the comments
section. The most interesting finds I
will add to the blog post itself. The emails are in eleven parts: